Income and Traffic Report | September 2018

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What is an income report?

An Income report for bloggers are posts about the previous month on our blogs. We generally talk about any income we may have generated through product sales, affiliate sales or online courses we provide. We may talk about how we did this and what was successful and what wasn’t.

We also talk about our traffic for the past month. This can provide insight into the strategies that a blog uses to gain traffic. Again, we will talk about what worked and didn’t work for us that particular month.

An income report is there to offer some behind the scenes insight into the blogging world. Many people think it is a get rich quick or easy route out. Blogging requires a lot of dedication, motivation and perseverance. The income report holds bloggers accountable for what they have or have not done, it provides motivation for the following month, even if the previous one has been dreadful or out of this world. It also means that the income report can show the rest of the world that you can be a blogger and you can be successful, for actually very little start-up cost.

This is why I think that writing an income report is important to share with others that are curious or want to start a blog.

So, what’s different about my income reports?

When I write an income report, I write them for the small-time blogger, the person who’s thinking about starting a blog or looking to go self-hosted and start being serious about it. It’s to show you that, it is possible if you put in the work.

I am soon to be a mum of two! Which means I can’t pour every waking second into my blog as some others can. I am here to prove though, that you can gain traffic and even income from your blog. It may take a little longer than others, but I have other priorities that will always come first, as you might as well.

Self-Hosting is a must!

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Goals from September

Regain my page view numbers

This month, my page views were down for September, as I’ll discuss further in the traffic report. I was disappointed though, mainly in the BOO BOO’s that I made this month.

To post consistently

I did post consistently this month and managed to be able to pre-write a few weeks worth of content in preparation for the birth of my little girl, which has taken the pressure off a bit.

To rework my email opt-ins

This I did do, with the help of Elna over at twinsmommy.com. I now offer multiple Opt-In’s for my email list, instead of one huge bundle that was trying to cater to everyone’s needs.

Create new pins for my most popular posts

I did manage to create new pins for my top 3 EVER posts, I’m currently trying to work on re-working my pin design. For me, this isn’t majorly important aspect at the moment though, so it will probably take a few months for this to happen.

Look into joining more group boards on Pinterest

I have joined about 5 or 6 more group boards on Pinterest this month. This has helped a little, with promoting my content on Pinterest. I am still trying to figure out the best pin strategy though. Which leads me to my next point quite nicely.

Invest in ‘Ready Set Blog for Traffic

This is something I am so happy I managed to do!! I had already taken Elnas’ Mailchimp course and it was amazing. It enabled me to set up my email list exactly how I wanted it. So investing in ‘Ready Set Blog for Traffic’was a NO-BRAINER! So far I am not even halfway through and have learnt so so much already. Her Pinterest Module should be a course on its own. This course is proving to be a very valuable resource. I highly recommend it.

What worked/didn’t work for me this month

Writing

Writing for me this month has worked better than any other. I have managed to pre-write quite a lot of content because I have really focused on it. This is also important because of the impending arrival of baby number 2! I have about a week left (at the time of writing) until she arrives, so I plan to get at least a months worth of content pre-written for you lovely lot.

Social media

Instagram has been easier for me this month. I have managed to post nearly every day and I am slowly getting the hang of it. I have only ever used Instagram as a personal account before. So using it for the blog has been a bit different. Still not using Facebook, or twitter. I post to twitter at the moment because my posts are linked to automatically post from Instagram and the blog, other than that though. It’s not a focus at the moment.

Email list

As well as my writing content, I have really focused on my email list. As I mentioned above, I took Elna’s from twins mommy MailChimp course and I couldn’t believe how easy she made it. I now have multiple freebies available for everyone. These are all FREE to download. You can print them or save them on your device. It’s up to you. I have seen a small amount of growth in my email list since doing this, I know that this will take time. I am just proud of myself for taking the course and setting up something properly and exactly how I wanted it. This is one of my FREE Downloadable Opt-in’s Below. Click to download.

September Posts

Self host your blog with Bluehost | In less than 15 minutes.

Third Trimester | 23 Things you should do.

Income and Traffic Report | August 2018.

Eco, How to Go More | September Goals.

20 Things to LOVE about Autumn.

Hospital Bag Essentials | All you really need.

Most popular posts in September

Third Trimester | 23 Things you should do.– 1748 Pageviews

First Trimester in Pregnancy | How you can survive using my Top 9 Tips.-196 Pageviews

Second Trimester Joy and 10 Things you should do.-187 Pageviews

Bandelettes | Do They Beat the Chub Rub?-42 Pageviews

Income and Traffic Report | July 2018-18 Pageviews

My pregnancy posts continue to take the top spot, and considering it usually takes a few weeks for a post to gain some traction and exposure, I was surprised that my third trimester post had the top spot this month because it was only posted in September.

I am still experimenting and testing out different blog topics and types of post to see what resonates with my audience, what they want to read and how I can help them. I would love it if you want to let me know what you want to read more of!

Traffic Report

Google Analytics

September has been a funny ol’ month over here at Eclectically Ema when it has come to pageviews. My page views dropped by over 1000 in September and my bounce rate doubled to over 88%?! As always I work out the actual number of page views once the pageviews that have bounced have been taken out of the equation. For September, this was 253.66. That’s about 10% of what it was in August. Gutted was not the word!!

I sat there for a good couple of weeks thinking “WHY ME?!” I was so elated by last month, that this seemed like a real punch in the teeth, especially because I had been concentrating on my email list and making sure I had content written. I was promoting my content, but it just didn’t seem to be working, and quite honestly I had no idea why.

Until I started looking at the breakdown of the pages that people were visiting, and noticing multiples of links, just in a different format……..

Then I remembered, I was trying to be all fancy and change how my URL’s looked. This effectively made all the posts I had already written and made Pins for…..UNREACHABLE! More on this catastrophe below!

As you can see from the massive spike in my impressions, I had a pin go mini-viral (for me anyway) from my third-trimester post…..this was a completely wasted opportunity because the person clicking on the pin just got sent to a 404 Error Page. When I realised what I had done, I could have almost cried. I was so annoyed with myself.

So How did I fix this?

The first thing I did was to make sure I found all the pins I could from my group boards I am part of as well as my own boards. Then manually changing the URL’s to the correct one. Now I knew that this was not going to touch the majority of the incorrect links, but it was something and at that moment in time, the only thing I could think of. It also meant I had to change the URL on all of the scheduled pins on Tailwind. These two things alone took me about 4 hours!

Then I wanted to change the Error Page message to something slightly more personal. I then completely broke the page. My week was not getting any better at this point. I managed to fix it in the end.

Then, about a week later I just happened to be reading a post about the most helpful plugins for WordPress. You can read my post on 20+ Essential plugins for your blog here. The post had included a redirect plugin. Then I knew that I could quite literally save my bacon in September.

I now will forever have that plugin installed, because, without it, a lot of my pinning time, designing and writing time will have been wasted.

If you have come across the same problem, I highly recommenda free plugin simply called Redirection. It will save you precious hours, that I lost!

Email Subscribers

I gained 2 email subscribers this month. That has doubled my email list. So a massive thank you to those people. This was because of the new opt-ins that I created. If you are interested, it was from my First-trimester cheatsheet and motivation Bundle, which you can grab for free below if you want!

Income Report

I didn’t make any income this month, and I think that this was partly due to my site being unreachable for so many, for the length of time that it was. Fingers crossed that next month is different!

If you’re looking to monetise, I really suggest using AWIN, all your affiliates are kept in one place and your clicks and commission are shown quite simply. Perfect for a beginner. Their commission rates aren’t bad either, they also have every question in their help section that you could think to ask, so an answer is never far away if you do get stuck.

Click through to sign up for AWIN using my link if like

I do earn a small commission for any services bought or signed up for with most of my links, but this does enable me to keep the blog running for you lovely lot!

I have decided notto include google ads on my blog as many others do. This is because I don’t get the choice of what is advertised, and I want to make sure that I am only promoting brands that I love and trust.

Outgoings

Definitely no regrets about my outgoings this month. As I mentioned before, this course is amazing!!

Ready Set Blog For Traffic= £94.00

As my hosting is paid for upfront and Tailwind was a gift and paid for in full for a year. I had no outgoings this month.

Tailwind is an amazing scheduling tool. I know that I certainly couldn’t pin as much if I were to do it manually. I also wouldn’t know what the best times to pin for my individual audience was. Tailwind does all this for you!

Use my link below to sign up to Tailwind, you’ll get 100 free pins, plus a $15 credit when you upgrade to the plus plan.

That’s the equivalent of a free month on the plus plan! That’s what I am currently on!

Summary

Not an amazing month, I managed to pretty much break my blog, then break my error page, double my bounce rate and drop my page views by 90%……..Role on October!!!

Even though I was disappointed by September, you can only learn from your mistakes and this is my third income report and third full month blogging. So what can we really expect?! I am only human and I have learnt from a lot of mistakes this month. I will never, ever…ever make them again!

Goals for October

To lower my bounce rate to at least 70%-I think that’s attainable now I’ve sorted out the URL thing.
To gain 5 more email subscribers- Again completely attainable with proper pinning now that my opt-ins are set up.
To have all of my Christmas posts written- This is still a secret, so I can’t tell you too much more!! Email subscribers will be the first to hear about it!

I am only setting 3 goals in this income report for October. This is obviously because I am going to have a newborn, and I don’t want to pile too much on myself, that way I can enjoy every moment with my new baby girl.

Have you made any blogging BOO BOO’s? what were they? how did you fix them? let us know!

Select an income report image, Pin it for later, Share it for the world to see, or just because you love it.

The blogging community is all about encouragement after all!

Income and Traffic Report | September 2018 – Eclectically Ema (2024)